day 289 – four vintage cosmetics

An odd collection, this. In fact, not really a collection at all. Just a few things that I picked up and haven’t quite decided what to do with.

The nail varnish came from my late mother’s things, and I liked it because of the tall tapered lid. All nail polish used to look like that, didn’t it?

I can’t remember where the ‘eye gloss’ came from, but I like the Mary Quant logo and package design.

The little metal lipstick must be very old (1940s?), and I got it ages ago at a jumble sale or something.

Last but not least, my favourite is the roll-on lip gloss, which is my own that I had as a teenager in the 1970s. I didn’t keep it all this time, but found it in my mother’s house. It is lemon-flavoured gloopy stuff, which I used to wear all the time. I thought I was pretty sophisticated.

I find old cosmetics very nostalgic, as they make me think of playing with my mother’s things as a child. Although my mother didn’t wear a lot of make-up, she never went out of the house without putting on lipstick. When I look at the old adverts and packaging now, they remind me of my yearning to emulate that adult femininity. There was (and often still is) a desirable glamour about cosmetics. As a teenager, I always found make-up fun, and I although I might question the gender politics of it now, I think I still do.